Burning Ice
by Platypus Craze7
Summary: "He was trying to make her understand, but she didn't want to. She wanted to continue blaming him because it was easy to associate his face with the death of the people she loved. And since he wouldn't leave her alone, she decided to let this new sense of life grow within her by attacking him." Post season 3, Katara/Zuko
1. Chapter 1

"I guess I'm not the only one who comes here."

She started at the sound of his voice but turned back to the horizon without saying anything. She didn't have anything kind to say to him after that awful night. If she hadn't been submerged in the calm of this place she would have been able to muster up something polite to say, but since he'd caught her off guard she decided silence was the best she could give him.

He sat next to her on the cliffside, letting his feet dangle off the edge next to hers and continued to just let the whispers of the wind and the crash of the waves speak for them as they watched the sun that promised to sink into the ocean.

She loved this place. There was a perfect balance between sea and wind, no room for death or destruction. But she guessed that this would probably change with his presence. The bitter thought intruded before she could stop herself.

"This seems to be the only place I can think clearly," he said, finally breaking the silence, "I don't know how, but the wind, it feels like, almost like-"

"—he's speaking to you." She surprised both of them by finishing his sentence. It felt natural and easy to talk to him. She decided to resent him for it.

"Yeah," he said with a sad smile.

Yes, the wind's playful breezes sounded like his sincere laugh and when it whipped through her hair and around her body, it almost felt like he was holding her again. But she had no intention of confiding any of this in Zuko, of all people.

"Please don't go," he said when she started to rise.

"Why?" she demanded unkindly, but stopped anyway, focusing on the way the sun was now bleeding crimson into the azure sky and sea. It looked like the world was burning and its blazon beauty only made her angrier.

"Katara," he paused and seemed to struggle for words, "Are you alright?"

"Considering what just happened, there would be something terribly wrong with me if I was." This was exactly why she didn't want to speak with him. She knew she was being unfair, but now that she'd started she couldn't stop.

"Of course, you're right," he said embarrassed and hurt, "I just, I hate seeing you like this. I want to help."

She sighed in frustration. "Do you really want to do this right now?"

"Please, if there's something I can do, tell me."

She rolled her eyes and began to release some of the anger she'd bottled for three days. "You could start by finding out that monster's weakness and killing her. Or better yet," she said with cruel enthusiasm, "you could go back in time and NOT knock me unconscious so I'm not able to save the best person I've ever met."

It felt so good to rail on him. For the first time since she learned of Aang's death, she felt alive. But she knew she was hurting him so she tried to end it by walking away. Unfortunately, he stood and tried again, refusing to let her leave that easily.

"It was what he wanted. All he cared about was making sure you were safe."

He was trying to make her understand, but she didn't want to. She just wanted to continue blaming him because it was easy to once again associate his face with the death of the people she loved. And since he wouldn't leave her alone, she decided to let this new sense of life grow within her by attacking him.

She rounded on him. "It wasn't your decision to make!" she jabbed his chest enough to make him back away, "You should have given me the choice instead of betraying me that way! Instead of betraying him that way!"

"You think I wanted Aang to die? Trust me, Katara, if there was anything I could do to change that moment, I would!" his calm demeanor had finally broken and he was fighting back tears.

"Well you can't!" she shouted through her own tears, pounding a faltering fist against his chest, "And now we're here and he's not!" She pounded another fist against his chest, left it there and stared at it, shaking with gritted teeth. "It should have been me." She hit him again, harder this time, terrified by the fact that she had almost said 'you' and even more disgusted that she almost believed it. With everything she had, she shouted again, "It should have been me!"

She hit him again and again, wishing he would shove her back, bend fire at her; just do something, anything to heighten the burning that dulled with each strike she used to feed it. She wanted to live, she wanted to die, she wanted to give up in every way she could but she just kept hitting him, no force behind her blows and no hope for a way to stop.

And then suddenly, for the first time in three days, she felt not just alive, but safe.

She expected and hoped for a fight when he grabbed her wrists to stop her senseless pounding, ready for him to finally make the switch from vulnerable to dangerous. She couldn't wait to try escaping his fire and unleash her gathered tempest against him, but the only heat she felt came from his arms around her and the sudden warmth of his body against hers. Her body reacted faster than her mind and she immediately released her storm of violence through tears and held onto him as if everything depended on it.

"Katara, I'm so sorry," he whispered as he cried with her, holding her tightly against his chest.

She had only expected to elicit hostility and violence from him, but his arms had come around her swift and strong and warm. Once calm finally drifted through her, she reveled in the security and comfort of his embrace. His skin was warm against hers and she imagined his heartbeat as a small, beautiful flame trying to gently spread its life into her and she gladly welcomed it.

So she matched her breathing to his, hoping to gather as much light from him as possible when a sudden pull seized her, telling her that there was more if she was willing to reach for it. Trying to ignore it, she focused once again on the increasing warmth of his heartbeat but this only led to the pull grasping her again and defining itself as an insistence to reach for him like waves seek the moon.

She drew back to look up at him and hesitantly whispered his name, wondering how she could sound both innocent and seductive at the same time. She decided not to care and instead lost herself in this overwhelming force that told her that amber was the most beautiful eye color she had ever seen and that she should never let the warmth of his hands leave her body.

Following the instinct of this pull, she wondered if her lips would burn if they were to touch his.

The wind angrily roared between them and through her hair, screaming of right and wrong in one deafening burst. Her body froze as she realized what she was about to do. Three days ago, she never would have dreamed of closing this gap between them. A death was what it had taken to tempt that possibility; the death of the only person she had thought could make her feel the way she did in this instant. There was no way she could take that step forward so soon towards the person she had blamed for Aang's death. So she immediately took a step back, knowing that she decreed an irrevocable distance between them with this single step.

It didn't matter if it was just her imagination or if Aang really did speak through the air; one gust was enough to wake her from the haze and drench her in a flood of shame and self-loathing. So without another word, she turned her back to the burning sunset, ran away from her friend, and tried to forget that she'd felt fire and found it beautiful.


	2. Chapter 2

"Wait! Where are you going?" She tried to shake off her interrupted sleep as she raced to keep up with him.

He kept his back to her as he walked, obviously wishing for a way out of this confrontation. "I think you know."

"You can't be serious! How do you expect this will go down?"

"I'll give her as much hell as I can and then go from there."

"Fine, then I'm coming with you." She followed him into the stable as he began to swing his pack onto the saddle of an unsuspecting ostrich-horse. She intercepted the strap mid-swing and slammed it into the stable wall, waiting expectantly for an answer after it thudded to the floor.

He let out a sigh of frustration. "No. I won't put you in danger."

"You know I can take care of myself just fine."

He didn't answer but started for his fallen pack.

"Come on, Zuko! There's no way you'll make it out alive!"

He stopped half-way to the wall and rounded on her, releasing accidental flames that traced the arc of his sudden movement.

He was angry.

Finally.

"Then so be it!"

It felt unbearably good to make him angry, but she resented him for cracking now, when she was arguing for something more than the sake of arguing. She'd been provoking him with every chance she had and his refusal to take her bait left her doubting if she would ever penetrate his humble and respectful façade.

"What are you saying? You don't care if you die?"

"What difference does it make, _you_ don't care if I do!"

"Of course I care! What have I ever said that would make you think I'd want that?"

He looked down and his words were quiet. "You never needed to say it."

Her stomach plummeted and only filled with icy guilt when she could feel it again. She never realized that he had read her so well and although she had realized long ago that blaming him for Aang's death only brought her more pain, they both knew that denying his words would be a lie.

He used her silence as another attempt at retrieving his pack. She caught the sweet scent of him as he passed her and she took a step back to escape their close proximity. She wished that he would understand that _this_ was the reason she distanced herself from him rather than her previously misplaced blame.

Irritated, she tried provoking him again. "Were you just going to steal this ostrich-horse anyway if I hadn't heard you leaving?"

At this he gave her a wry smile and said, "We did the same thing with Appa in the good ole days. Thought you'd understand." Once again he started to shoulder the pack and once again she interrupted him. She grabbed his wrist and thrust it toward the ground. He sighed as he let his pack drop to the ground.

He was frustrated. Good. Frustrated meant he was alive. Frustrated meant that he was still burning inside and that she could finally revel in the heat of that anger she'd been working so hard to kindle.

"I won't let you go. You know I've been aching for a chance to fight you and I'll gladly take it if it stops you." She spoke quietly to his back and rubbed her thumb against his wrist, taunting him with her slight advantage over him. She wanted him to attack her, so she could feed off his angry flames, because this way he would still be alive but they would never give in to the other possibility of her skin against his.

"Katara," his voice was soft, raspy, pleading, with no edge of violence and she hated him for it, "I need to do this, please."

"This can't be about your honor." She had meant it to cut, but her tone echoed his, and her concern floated above her anger.

He turned to face her and she let her hold on his wrist loosen. His eyes were tormented embers and she quickly realized that, alive or not, she took no pleasure in his pain.

"Aang was probably one of the best friends I have ever had. Now that I've found a chance to avenge him, I can't sit by and do nothing about it."

"Zuko, don't do this! When I tried to avenge my mother I realized it would never give me peace. You were there. Do you think Aang of all people would want you to die in a hopeless attempt to avenge him?" She gently slid her hand down from his wrist to hold his hand. Her heart pounded at the warmth of his touch and although he tried to hide it, his sudden intake of breath told her that he felt it too.

But like her, he used the energy to attack. "So have you found it within yourself to forgive that monster? Aang suffered, Katara. You didn't hear his screams."

"Because you didn't give me the choice!" Tears welled up in her eyes and she shouted, "Why are you telling me this?"

"I'm sorry, Katara. I just want you to understand."

"And I just want you to live," she said through tears, "and if that means fighting you, I'll do it." She searched for water in the humid air and let it flow in her hands as she backed away from him.

He stepped towards her and she swallowed, pushing through her desire by defining her stance. Ignoring her insistence to fight, he gently placed his hands on either side of her face and pressed his lips to her forehead.

"Let me go, Katara," he whispered, "I'll only fight you if I have no other choice."

She relaxed her stance but didn't let go of the water. He lingered to give her a small smile that said thank you and turned back to his pack once more.

That smile made her ache for him like she never had before. A year ago, she had guiltily resisted this urge because it seemed disrespectful, but she couldn't afford to worry about the dead anymore. Right now Zuko was only two feet away, safely in the world of the living, but in seconds he would be gone forever.

"Then don't hold back," she said, pounding frozen water against the ground and sending angry shards everywhere, "because I won't."

She swiftly grabbed his shoulder and pulled him towards her, reaching for his scarred face. She felt his reluctant anger, felt his body tense in preparation for the inevitable fight and felt the heat rise slowly as he unenthusiastically gathered flame into his hand.

But she kissed him.

With all the passion she had poured into a year of rage and misled hate against him, she kissed him. His small smile of a thank you made her burn infinitely more than any of his violence ever would and that alone was worth keeping him alive.

She heard the maltreated sack fall limp to the floor and heard the roar of the flames surge as he threw an exploding flame into the air above them. She felt his body twist to face hers and felt his arms encircle her tightly as she knew they would. He kissed her with a passion she knew he could only give her. It was the first time in a year that he hadn't held any part of himself back from her. She finally understood him and he finally understood her. All was said through lips but spoken without words.

He was heat and life, breathing into her the essence of flame's life. She was calm and healing, soothing his tormented spirit like a gentle stream. They pulled apart, breathing heavily and just holding each other's gaze for a few moments. She was relieved to find that she didn't regret her brash action nor did it leave her feeling guilty. She was just angry with herself because she should have known that he'd give himself enough hell without her help. But she needed him alive more than ever and she knew now that there wasn't anything she wouldn't do to save him.

"I'm so sorry, Zuko," she cried into his shoulder, "I don't blame you and I won't abandon you again, just please, don't do this."

"You know I have to go, Katara," he breathed into her hair, sad and resigned.

"Maybe you do," she said pulling away from him, "but you don't have to go to her and you certainly don't have to go alone."

She drew her hands across his chest to rest them over his heart. Again the steady pounding reminded her of a burning flame, the embodiment of heat and light and life. It burned brighter beneath her fingertips and she struggled for the words to make him understand that its beat gave her just as much life as it gave him.

"You're alive," she clutched tighter at his chest as if she could heal him with pure emotion, "and I can never let this go."

He placed his hands over hers and swallowed. He leaned close to her, so close that she thought he would kiss her again and she unconsciously closed her eyes and mirrored his movement, craving his touch despite her fear that it might be their last. Instead, he whispered, "Let's go then."

He waited for her to understand before pulling her onto the ostrich-horse with him in one fluid movement. She managed to kick the pack that had been everything but forgotten onto the saddle before they rode out of the stables, leaving behind their destructive pain and riding towards something that might be as warm as fire and soothing like a stream.


End file.
